New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1887-12-07
REMAINS HISTORY OF ISRAEL
APPLIED MArERIALlSM.

The anpearance of the hrst volume Oh M ne
M ,'s Ustorg of the People o! Israel Is literary
event of much interest and the character OF tue
work Itself is sucn as 10 render it not Improbably
arathcr exciting one. The lines upon winch Nj.
Roman writes history arc now well understood.
md 1t was inevitable that when applied to the
history of tue Jews his methods must produce
singular results. In his preface he predicts that
two classes will he dissatisfied with his history
the Jews who hold that nothing which is not
apologetic should be written concerning their an
cestors and the sceptics who hold that in dealing
with tradition immersed i'll fable the only scen-
tfc course is to reject everything "To satisfy
historians of this school," lie says " the present
volume ought to have been blank page" But he
holds that where certainty is out of the ques-
ton. as with the semi-mythical records of pre-
historic peoples and ages, great deal of light may
be obtained upon their history: such as the poems
of Homer throw upon archaic Greek civilization, or
the Arabian poems upon the life OF the Desert.
He rejects as matter of course, the supernatural
bloc and it needless to say that this elimination
leaves Jewish history in a peculiar position But NJ
Rcnan, while putting aside the miraculous thus
sunni arIly, draws distinctions the Justification Tor
which is not always readily apparent Thus ia
wholly ignores a considerable proportion of re-
ported supernatural occurrences; while as to others
he retains the rootfacts and explains them III some
rationaiistic manner There can be no doubt shat
the freedom of Interpretation which this method
permits is calculated TO strengthen the picturesque
ness of such history but at the same time 1t
offers many temptations to the historian to put
his own color upon the incidents thus arbitrarily
dealt with that the reader is made TO doubt, before
he has proceeded far. whether the most thorough
going theory of approximations could involve
larger demands upon his creduty than TINS
capricious arrangement of material under the
4 4 81 In
admitted that IN the sklful hands of NJ. Renan
the picture becomes vivid, life-hke and natural,
and If one does not pause to inquire how much of
il is fact and how much fiction the effect Is fasci-
mating enough. But when we asked to accept
as history statements so many of which are palpa-
bly, evolved from the inner CONSCIOUSNESS OF the
author, we must be pardoncd II we demur to the
proposition and especially If We fail to recognize
in the msterastic imaginingS of the brilliant
Frenchman any surer ground than the Old Testa-
ment books offered.
NJ Renan takes up the people OF Israel
as small Spectacular tribe, living the
nomad hfe little advanced beyond saw
agery but even then possessing strong ten
denotes toward mOnotheIsm tendencies differ
entIating them from the Aryans, whose earliest
bias was polythcistic. The simplicity and COM
parative purity of the Semitic theology he ascrbes
III part to the pecularties of the Language, whose
severity and effectiveness discouraged expression
save on the plancst lines and rendered almost i'm
possible the cultivation of poetry. The pre-patri-
archa lite, NJ Rcnan holds, was very similar to
that which NAV still be studied among the wander
ing Bedouins. The tribe was the state; the family
the unit At first Elohim-the gods-were wor
shipped but gradually theconceD tratiOn of worship
upon one god-Iahve-put the ElOhim in the back
ground. IahN6. however, was tribal deity, and
many others were vorshpped; In fact. 1t was the
custom to adopt anOther's gods, as the Israeli
ties are repeatedly shown dong in the Old Testa-
lneut. All deities considered powerful at
time when every phenomenon of nature was held
TO be the work of some supernatural being, and
nomadIc tribes invariably paid their devOtons to
the gods of tie tribes or peoples among whom their
wanderings brought them.
The people of Israel, according to NJ Renan,
owed much to the Babylonans The whole story
of Abraham, he thinks, came thence, together with
many other ideas, of which the majority were
crudely uninterrupted by the Uniformed intelli-
eenccs of these sem-savages. BIbyo possessed a
comparatively high civilization when the Jews were
still sunk baTbarism. and ages Def re they had
attained the art of writing, Babylon had a
literature, and body of science and philosophy
Thence, III passing. the lsraelites obtained their
legends Of the Deuge of the Tower Of Babel, of the
Creation. and thence. also, they derived what ~
Renan calls the legend of Abraham, whom he regards
as NEUROLOGICAL parsonage. Tho Semitic
shepherds" he says, " who wandered in these re-
gions heard all this. They profoundly i'm
pressed. Their situation was that of Mahomet who
could neither read write. in presence OF Christ
ianiiy and Judaism. Everything was transmitted
orally. The resemblance between the Hebrew
recitals aud the ancient Babylonian accounts was
Of the same kind as that between he Koran and the
Bible and Gospel In accordan:e With their eu-
benerstic spirit and their aversion from my hOl-
ogy the Semitic nomads simplIhed these old fables,
and reduced them TO 70 ume small enough TO be
carried ea-Iiy with their nomadic baggage" And
thus "the story of the creation became sober Par
adIse was materialIlcd its topography. in proper
ton as they departed from Lower Chaldea, took
vague and contradictory air; the mythical kings
who according to the Babylonian narrative. reIgned
three OF four thousand years, became patrIarchs,
living eight nine hundred years. That seemed
less difficult to admit. he deuge at the same
time took on a moral Specification it was pun
ishment." In tins way the Semitic DOmads ac
CURED the basis OF then cOsmOgony as subsequently
introduced to the book of Genesis But 1t was the
Semitic terseness aud simplicity of the transforTa
ton which gave 1t life. The nOmad shepherd
did not invent these wonderful stories; but he
made them successful. The Chadean cosmosony
never would have conquered the world under the
exuberant form IT bore in the Assyrian texts; the
simpiifcatlon impaired by the Semitic genius
supplied exactly what that lacked, at
the moment when the human mind demanded clear
ideas upon matters absolute knowledge Of which
was unattanable" Aud the French philosopher
concludes: This time the desert has been more
prolific than the prairie Monstrosities, which
would have been smothered in the rubbish heap Of
Orentallsn, have become apparent proofs The
dry and sober Imagination of Israel has worked
this miracle. That which i'll Bero,us is grotesque,
has been made to appear, in the Bible narrative,
30 true, natural, that our Western creduity has
received IT for history, and has believed that in
accepting these fables 1t was breaking with my
theology"
NJ Renan has special chapter on the name
Ilhve which is very interesting. While admit